Global Economics

Vodafone Makes New Mobile Internet Push

The British wireless carrier launches advanced mobile Web access with the help of such brands as Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo

Vodafone has teamed up with leading web brands to bring services usually associated with broadband-enabled PCs to UK mobile customers.

The mobile operator, the world's largest by revenues, has inked deals with a long list of big hitters including AOL, eBay, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo!. In February a tie-up was announced with News Corp's MySpace and today's announcement also covers that popular social networking brand.

The company said most customers won't need to buy a new handset - Vodafone Mobile Internet takes pages designed for a PC screen and compresses them by up to 10 times.

Vodafone's UK CEO Nick Read has promised the rollout "will revolutionise the way customers use the internet" - though services such as Google search, popular webmail or making and taking bids on eBay are already available across a range of operators.

The latest push comes with new pricing. For example a £7.50 monthly addition for subscription customers gives up to 120MB of data downloads per month. Full pricing details are available from the Vodafone website.